Egosoft announces that
X3: Reunion is gold (thanks Frans), and that preorders are now being accepted
for the latest installment in Egosoft's space shooter series, which is due for
release in the U.K. on October 28:

Egosoft is today pleased to announce that X3:
Reunion, the latest in the exciting space simulation series of X-Universe games
has “gone Gold” with release dates to be shortly confirmed by regional
publishers. The UK anticipated release date is expected to be confirmed by
Deepsilver as 28 October 2005. The German version will follow very soon after.

Speaking from the Egosoft HQ in Würselen, Germany CEO Bernd Lehahn confirmed “X3
marks a genuine and dramatic milestone in our game development. Close on 2 years
of hard work have brought us to the point where we are ready to take the space
genre onto a whole new level and directly into the mainstream of gaming, and to
keep it fresh into the future.”

Egosoft would like to thank our staff, publishers and all the fans who have
helped bring us this far, and will continue with us for the future.

As a result of the news we have all been waiting so long for, you can now
pre-order X3: Reunion direct from the Egosoft shop. English versions will be
available first, and as a bonus will be shipping with a free copy of Helge
Kautz's Farnham's Legend.

Gee, that sounds a lot like the game we're currently working on for PC & XBox360. Its tentatively called KnightBlade.

Yes, it will have 3D cockpits, since there are few user playable fighters in this game; unlike the much larger BC/UC games.

Any chance you can discuss what kinds of gameplay goes on in the "on ship" segments?

I definitely think we need to see some fully fleshed out "live on a spaceship" games, but it seems like lots of the mundane day-to-day stuff could get pretty boring (that tedium is even an extremely common theme for space-exploration sci-fi, for example)..

I always figure being on a spaceship would be a little bit like being locked in a prison where if you try to escape, you'll freeze to death and float off into infinity

imagine a space game where you actually lived inside the ship. Sorta like a FPS with a space simulator side.

Like.. you can wander inside the ship and visit several areas, the dorm room, the coffee room, gym, whatever. You could actually walk inside the ship, in a first-person perspective. Then, outta nowhere, the alarm sounds off, lights blinking, and you have to run your way to the bridge and occupy your position and prepare for fight!

Now THAT would be awesomeobviously, playing alone would suck so the fun factor would be in gathering with friends online, be it in CO-OP or whatever. A real fantasy would be on having this sort of game on a MMORPG, but that would be insane.

And then, we try to board an enemy ship and we'd switch to a FPS game, invading and killing the enemies! booya!

Gee, that sounds a lot like the game we're currently working on for PC & XBox360. Its tentatively called KnightBlade.

Yes, it will have 3D cockpits, since there are few user playable fighters in this game; unlike the much larger BC/UC games.

Game developers are just human beings who happen to make games for a living. If you want to hold us up to higher standards of conduct, then go ahead...but don't be surprised if we don't uphold them

What do you mean Creston? You mean the ability to toggle the cockpits on|off?

No, I wish The_Abyss, the site admin has acknowledged on their forums, alluding to several interviews Egosoft staff did in Leipzig earlier this summer, that X3 will NOT HAVE any cockpits at all.

The few shots we saw with (old X2 cockpits) were placeholders, I guess for if they decided to do cockpits later, but it's been confirmed that there are NO cockpits whatsoever in the game. Which saddens me, because it horribly breaks immersion.

I'll live with it, and won't notice it after awhile, but it's not a great decision in my book...

Creston

Edit : Anybody know if Newton has taken a backseat on this version as well? X2 would have been so much better IMO if you had to take into account the basic laws of motion.

No, there is newtonian movement in X3, that has been confirmed. So you can do powerslides etc. It's not 100%, there's still an arcadey feel to movement, but it's less so than X2. Or at least, that's what I gather from the forum.I think Privateer compares to it the best, which is great because Privateer had the coolest powerslides ever done in a space game.

imagine a space game where you actually lived inside the ship. Sorta like a FPS with a space simulator side.

Like.. you can wander inside the ship and visit several areas, the dorm room, the coffee room, gym, whatever. You could actually walk inside the ship, in a first-person perspective. Then, outta nowhere, the alarm sounds off, lights blinking, and you have to run your way to the bridge and occupy your position and prepare for fight!

Now THAT would be awesomeobviously, playing alone would suck so the fun factor would be in gathering with friends online, be it in CO-OP or whatever. A real fantasy would be on having this sort of game on a MMORPG, but that would be insane.

And then, we try to board an enemy ship and we'd switch to a FPS game, invading and killing the enemies! booya!

Is there some sort of first person view from a cockpit type position? That would do, surely all MFDs and readouts would be thought controlled and rendered in helmet when space tech is that advanced . Just as long as they've kept the mini-windows and opened multi-monitor support to include ATi cards, I'll be happy - X2's mini-windows were great.

Surprised (and impressed) by DSmart's opinions and insight when he's not talking about his games/community or to responding to critizism, all in the style of RM for some reason,

He means the lack of cockpit graphics in X3, as in there are none, only a HUD this time around. I'm a bit disappointed too as this seems like a step backwards for the series, but whatever, I'll get over it about 5 minutes after starting the game I'm sure.

Bummer. I remember when I had cockpits as well in the first two (BC3K, BC3K v2.0) games. That was only when you had fewer ships. Once the next games (BCM and beyond) came around and the number of player controlled ships grew exponentially, all bets were off. To this day, the BC/UC gamers are still clamouring for them. It costs a *ton* of money to do. Then you have to implement them. And if they are all different designs, well, the GUI gets to be a mess of spaghetti code. Thats why in the X series, the MFDs were not *part of* the cockpits, but rather superimposed on them.

Cockpits are also a major rendering bottleneck depending on how they are done, the graphics card etc. So, I can understand why they were removed.

Hopefully the new and revamped GUI in X3 will makeup for the lack of cockpits.

This comment was edited on Oct 17, 19:30.

Game developers are just human beings who happen to make games for a living. If you want to hold us up to higher standards of conduct, then go ahead...but don't be surprised if we don't uphold them

uhm, NEWSFLASH! major money does not mean you get a good game out of it. Heck, 95% of the PC games released have major bucks behind them. And they flop. So I'm not sure that we want to have this argument.

95% of pc games released have major $$$ behind them?!?!?! LOL IT would be the majority if only 10 games a year where released on the PC!Maybe if you count the xbox as a PC that would be correct. Why do you think so many good PC games like R6, Mech worrior, become console games?

Anyways I should not even be commenting on this since I do not know what brought that argument into the discussion.

uhm, NEWSFLASH! major money does not mean you get a good game out of it. Heck, 95% of the PC games released have major bucks behind them. And they flop. So I'm not sure that we want to have this argument.

I just read Greg Costikyan's pieces in the Escapist about the developer's poverty cycle. Interesting stuff.

It looks great... I just hope it plays as well as it looks. Graphics have come on so much it should be interesting. It's been a while since I've played a great space game... I loved Starlancer, though it was a bit simplistic - Tie Fighter is still my favourite.

I do agree that joystick selection seems to be pretty poor recently, however I think it would be better playing with mouse/keyboard, especially as it opens up greater freedom through keyboard shortcuts - however, I'm tempted to get an X360 controller for my PC when they are released.

What do you mean Creston? You mean the ability to toggle the cockpits on|off?

He means the lack of cockpit graphics in X3, as in there are none, only a HUD this time around. I'm a bit disappointed too as this seems like a step backwards for the series, but whatever, I'll get over it about 5 minutes after starting the game I'm sure.

What do you mean Creston? You mean the ability to toggle the cockpits on|off?

Even battlecruiser had a fun space game compared to this.

Yeah, we know. But the X games were never about combat, really. Its all about trading, exploring, amassing wealth etc. So they focused on those parts and did them well.

e.g. my games are about combat - combat - combat; so the trading aspects are minimal (at best); though that hasn't stopped the enterprising BC/UC gamer from doing what they can with it. I never intended for my game to be about trading. I just happened to add it in - and kept it in - because trading is the staple of legacy space games. I should have removed it a long time ago, but when I even whispered it, I swear I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand up when I visited my forum discussion about it. No way was I going to get lynch.

However Ill never buy another battlecruiser game untill he gets some major money behind it

uhm, NEWSFLASH!major money does not mean you get a good game out of it. Heck, 95% of the PC games released have major bucks behind them. And they flop. So I'm not sure that we want to have this argument.

and updated control schemes that work with Logitek joysticks or Gravis even.

Looks like you've missed several generations of my games because all controllers - even mouse flight - are supported. As long as DirectX knows about it, the game will use it. But don't take my word for it; before jumping to conclusions, try the demo.

Game developers are just human beings who happen to make games for a living. If you want to hold us up to higher standards of conduct, then go ahead...but don't be surprised if we don't uphold them